Byline: Mike Considine
Former Geneva pole vaulter Ryker Jones wasn't at the Big Ten track and
field meet Feb. 23, but he was touched by the tragedy that occurred -
as virtually every vaulter past and present must have been.
Penn State sophomore Kevin Dare, a young man Jones' age, died in a freak pole vaulting accident at the meet in Minneapolis.
Jones didn't attend or compete at the meet this year. He was spared the sight of the fatal accident.
However, he is left with memories of Dare. Last year, as a University of Indiana freshman vaulter, he spent time with Dare.
"Most of the vaulters there are really nice," Jones said. "He and a
teammate came to our hotel room and took us out to show us Penn State,
and out for the night."
Jones first reaction was confusion because initial details on the Internet were sketchy.
"It was more shocking than anything," he said. "I was looking for
results online. I read about the accident, but I was kind of unsure and
wondering how it happened.
"The pole could have broken. He could have landed short of the pit. He could have landed behind the pit."
As Dare approached the pit, he became airborne short of the bar and
landed backward on the metal vault box where the pole is planted. He
never regained consciousness after the fall. His skull was crushed.
In the days that followed, Jones heard the first-hand accounts of IU teammates to supplement news stories.
"It was definitely a gruesome accident," he said. "It wasn't like a blow to the head. It was very graphic."
After a few days of mourning, Jones and his teammates were encouraged
by the coaching staff to vault again perhaps in the way riders thrown
from horses are encouraged to get back on.
"A lot of people
say your odds are still better of dying in a car accident," Jones said.
"I don't really think it's about odds. Pole vaulting is a dangerous
sport, but you kind of are in control. It's not like a car accident.
"The kid was a really good vaulter. He had been vaulting a long time.
After you've been vaulting a long time, you get a sense of where you
are in the air and how you feel on the pole. You know how you're going
to fall. I've thought about it a lot."
The nature of the
event is that nothing is a given. Tiny variables can throw off
performance and are hard to correct during a competition. Vaulters
consider the challenge its own reward.
Jones set the Geneva
school record in 2000 at 14-10 but wasn't able to qualify for the state
meet because he couldn't penetrate deep enough to clear his opening
height. He had cleared the qualifying height (13-6) in every previous
meet that season.
Jones is searching for that rhythm now.
Indiana sent its top three vaulters to the Big Ten meet. The sophomore
is the No. 4 man.
"If I was first or fourth, it wouldn't
matter," said Jones, who unquestionably is a perfectionist. "With what
I'm doing, I wouldn't contribute. It's nothing specific. At practice I
might be able to jump 16 (feet), but the next vaulting day things seem
to fall apart. I'm working on jumping consistently."
Dare
was a junior national champion. He had cleared 16 -6 3/4 inches. The
accident occurred on an attempt at 15-7, which should have been in his
comfort zone.
"It never crossed my mind - dying from
vaulting," Jones said. "Now we're forced to think about it, that it can
happen, even if we're experienced. That's what shook us up."
Factions who want to eliminate the pole vault at the high school are
likely to gravitate to this high-profile freak accident.
A
1998 University of North Carolina study found that 13 high school pole
vaulters died from accidents between 1982 and 1997. A high school
vaulter in Florida died in a Feb. 15 accident, eight days before
Dare's.
Obviously, any death is too many, but the numbers don't cry for extreme measures.
"I coached football for years and years," Geneva pole vault coach Jerry
Vitton said. "Football players die every year. Nobody talks about
getting rid of football.
"There is a risk involved, not just in pole vaulting but in shot put and discus."
The IHSA is considering a National Federation of State High School
Associations proposal that would require high schools to have larger
pits and a coaching box.
Locally, pits at Geneva and
Kaneland already are large enough to fall within the compliance area.
Vitton estimates that 25 percent of the state's high schools would have
to buy new pits.
"If they have to buy a $5,000 pit," Vitton said, "that's a big expenditure for some schools ."
That could be an excuse for administrators to drop the event.
The coaching box would help coaches steer struggling vaulters to use
lighter poles or adjust their technique to land safely.
"In
the '90s, I didn't think I'd be coaching in the next decade because of
a couple of accidents that happened," St. Charles East pole vault coach
Bruce McEvoy said. "Yet, on many levels, they're doing what they can to
make it safer."
As the accident at the Big Ten meet points out, caution doesn't necessarily facilitate prevention.
"(Dare) thought he had cleared the bar and came down backward," Jones
said. "He got disoriented. Obviously, that can happen. After a while he
got a sense that something was wrong and tried to correct it, but what
he did made it worse."
Jones added, "I know exactly how it happened, but I don't know if other people will understand."
The challenge for administrators is to consider both the athlete's love
of his event and his safety, and take the best course of action to find
a balance between.
Mike Considine can be reached by phone at (630) 587-8642 or by e-mail at mconsidine@@dailyherald.com.
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